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Nik M. Shazmie

Born 1991 in Kuala Krai, Kelantan, Malaysia

The middle of the three talented Nik Brothers, Shazmie’s current work seeks to create a “new movement”, combining the intricacies of realistic detailing and techniques, and the Cubism art style of Picasso. This young artist has attained a certain level of success with this approach, winning the Gold Prize in the 2015 UOB Painting of The Year competition.

Among the areas examined by Shazmie is the distorted view of beauty many people today have. Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but it is usually no deeper than what the eye can see. Shazmie lays bare the obsession of “perfection” that seems to be the pursuit endgame for many today, by individuals wanting parts of themselves looking like the manufactured beauty they see in the media, embodied by personalities they admire.

By combining “the best features” a person might want, the resulting portraitures are, quite simply, grotesque. The young artist sees himself as a plastic surgeon operating on paintings, instead of people, deconstructing portraits and reassembling them in ways that are less than expected. But better the grotesque on canvas, we reckon, rather than the real world results of plastic surgeries gone wrong we hear about every now and again.

Among the specific topics that Shazmie has tackled recently include identity crisis, as depicted in the Rebecca series of works. The pursuit of perfection in beauty leads some to change not only the physical aspects of their natural self through surgical augmentation, but also every possible aspect of their identity. Everything, down to their names, often adopting names that would not normally be found in their original cultures.

As an artist, I put myself in the position of a Plastic Surgeon. I always imagine the portraits of people around me as being editable, like replacing their noses or lips with something that looks more appealing. I collect the best features in different faces then transfer these onto the surface of my works, constructing new characters manifesting the idea of perfection.